Schopenhauer's Porcupines by Luepnitz Deborah Anna

Author:Luepnitz, Deborah Anna. [Luepnitz, Deborah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hachette Book Group (Perseus)
Published: 2011-11-30T16:00:00+00:00

“You know what I like about you, Deborah? You know what I appreciate? That we could agree to disagree about abortion.”

“You were afraid I would try to change your mind.”

“And you didn’t. I mean, you made me think, but not like: ‘You asshole, don’t you see the error of your ways?’ And I know this is a big cause of yours, or I imagine it is.”

“Tell me what you imagine.”

“That you’re gung-ho.”

“About being pro-choice?”

“Yeah.”

“Can you say more?”

“It’s not that I see you jumping up and down in the streets or anything. I figure you’re the type to write to your congressman, or write articles. The things therapists do when they’re gung-ho.”

“It sounds like you have the impression that therapists keep their politics indoors.”

“I guess. Am I way off base here? You’re such a reserved person, I can’t picture you going to rallies. Do you?”

I was going to be uncomfortable whether I answered directly or didn’t.

“Actually, lots of therapists attend demonstrations. Me included.”

“Oh yeah?” And then he looked at me, pinching his nostrils a few times while a thought as vexing as a Sphinx’s riddle grew in his head. Dave said:

“You live in Philadelphia, don’t you?”

“I do, actually.”

Since Dave’s therapy started, I hadn’t seen him in front of the clinic. In fact, there had been a lull in anti-clinic activity at that particular site.

“I haven’t been to a demonstration in a while,” he volunteered. “It’s really not my kind of thing, to tell the truth. Dr. Luepnitz, were we at the same demonstrations?”

Dave was able to pinpoint exactly when he had done his clinic duty. I knew that I had also been there on at least one of those occasions. So we had attended the same demonstration at least one time.

Dave wanted to know, of course, if I had realized this all along. I explained that we were well into the treatment before it occurred to me as a possibility. And in trying to place a face I had seen briefly in a large crowd, how could I be sure? The question of whether or not we’d been on opposite sides of the street didn’t seem as important to me as the work we were able to engage together.

“Do you disagree?” I asked. “Do you wish I had brought it up the second it came to my mind?”

“I don’t know. No. It’s just weird. What if we had run into each other some day on the opposite side of the street?”

“We would have talked about it in the next session.”

Therapists and patients should not be friends, but they usually do inhabit the same geographical region, and sometimes the same neighborhood. It’s not unusual to run into one’s therapist at some point at the bakery or at the movies. A colleague of mine was sitting with her husband in the waiting room of a fertility clinic when one of her therapy patients walked in with his wife. The four of them tried to greet each other respectfully while clutching small vials of body fluids.

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